Cutting long form HDV

Hi All,
I'm about to begin cutting a feature that will be shot on HDV 1080p24 using the Canon XL H1. I'm on FCP 5.1.4 on an Intel dual core 2.33Ghz.

I'm wondering what problems I'll run into if I keep the footage native all the way across. I've heard it's a nightmare, but I've never run into problems on any of the short stuff I've cut native other than renders here and there on FCP 5.

Not sure what we're finishing on yet.

What should I look out for? What would be the best workflow? Will I avoid potential problems by upgrading to FCP6?

We're considering converting to AIC after digitizing, would that be the best way to do it?


Thanks in advance.

> Will I avoid potential problems by upgrading to FCP6?

I'll work in ProRes with HDV footage which only comes with FCP 6. HDV is more of an acquisition codec. With ProRes you get much shorter conform/rendering times, the benefits of non-GOP editing, and pretty good quality for size.. AIC from what I recall, was a 4:2:0 codec. not as good as prores

>I've never run into problems on any of the short stuff I've cut native other than renders
>here and there on FCP 5.

What kind of issues after rendering HDV?



www.strypesinpost.com

I work with FCP 5.1.4 on an intel like yours using the HDV codec and my advice is if you stick with the native plan your work around the long conforming and rendering times, particularly if you apply broadcast filters, magic bullet etc...... I have found that you'll avoid being up against it when there is a deadline looming and stuff still needs rendering and conforming.

The way i work is to produce the 20 minute feature, apply filters etc then set it up to conform and render at the end of each day over night......

The longest HDV thing I've cut has been an hour and 15 minute program, on 5.1.4. It was shot with the XH A1, 60i HDV, captured HDV and edited. No problems at all. On my own system, Studio 2, I'm shooting all 24F with the Canon, capturing HDV1080P24 and editing in the HDV timeline. Again, no problems. I'm using a new MacbookPro, 17" high res, 4 gigs of RAM and a 23" CinemaDisplay. I still edit periodically on a friend's 5.1.4 system and have converted him to shooting 24p, and again, no problems in that mode either.

Never had a problem using native HDV codec on 3+ hour projects. I have a quad-core Mac Pro and am using the latest FCP studio.

Casey Petersen
www.unitedvideoinc.com

If FCP6 is an option then it would be a good idea. Whilst working with HDV is not the bear it used to be given the raw oompf of todays computers, FCP6's unique ability to select ProRes as the render codec in an otherwise HDV native timeline is a huge plus. You get all the benefits of both worlds.

It also depends on what your final output will be...are you going back to HDV tape? That's what I do. I did an experiment with ProRes from an HDV source and the files were 3-4 times larger, and getting it back to HDV took awhile, so especially for long form projects (and if you're outputting back to HDV) I would not recommend ProRes, from my experience.

Here's a snippet from a post I made back in March about my ProRes test:

I had been hearing a lot of good things about ProRes, and I was also confused quite a bit on whether or not I should be using it or not. I thought I'd perform a real life test and report my findings. I'm a wedding videographer, by the way, and we shoot with the Sony Z1U cameras, normally edit in HDV, and then print to video back to HDV. I run the edited footage into my set-top DVD recorder, strip out the video off the disc and then author in DVD SP.

Here's what I found with editing ProRes footage:

I was able to capture through timecode gaps caused by the Z1U when QuickRecord is turned on.

Every shot was captured into it's own file, which was a little trickier when it came down to trimming, because I usually trim footage from one long clip, and delete the excess between edits, this was trickier because some shots I didn't use, and had to try to avoid confusing them with shots I did want to use.

Scanning through the footage was slower...I couldn't play back at 2x smoothly enough to hear the audio.

Rendering time on practically everything was slower (slow mo, filters, etc).

File sizes are 3-4 times larger, which is not fun if you're capturing on a different computer and copying the files over to the edit computer.

It took 150 minutes to prepare for a Print to Video on a 25 minute clip on a MacBook Pro, but it only took 15 minutes to prepare for a Print to Video on a 15 minute clip on a Mac Pro with 2 dual core processors.

Smooth cam was easier to work with, since I didn't have to export the video to a smaller clip first.

Quality-wise, I couldn't really see much difference.


That's what I learned on my ProRes test....I'm not planning on using it again anytime in the near future for what I'm doing....it's best to stay native, and I proved that!

>Quality-wise, I couldn't really see much difference.

That's the main beauty of it. Theoretically lossy, not so in practice....

> Rendering time on practically everything was slower (slow mo, filters, etc).

You gotta be kidding. You don't take hours when you hit "render all". It's all I-frame, just like DV, DvcPro50, Uncompressed, etc... No rearrangement of the GOP (conforming).

>It took 150 minutes to prepare for a Print to Video on a 25 minute clip on a MacBook Pro, but it
>only took 15 minutes to prepare for a Print to Video on a 15 minute clip on a Mac Pro with 2 dual
>core processors.

Doesn't seem to tally. The same clip, unrendered?



www.strypesinpost.com

Yeah....I didn't say it made sense! That's just the reality of what happened on my project.

Captured HDV tape as ProRes, edited on ProRes timeline, Print to Video back to HDV.

Go figure.

> Captured HDV tape as ProRes, edited on ProRes timeline, Print to Video back to HDV.

There isn't a significant benefit editing/rendering to ProRes if you are going back out to HDV. You'll still need to conform it back to HDV. Though, is conforming ProRes to HDV faster than Conforming HDV?



www.strypesinpost.com

Nope...that's why I don't do it anymore

I think the conforming process took longer with ProRes, but even if it didn't, with the render times of clips with filters or speed changes taking so much longer to render, it's just not worth it.

I was a little confused when I first tested out the ProRes codec for rendering clips...it seemed to go so much faster rendering filters/speed, etc., but when I did the whole project in ProRes, it was 2-3 times slower. Also when I tried to render clips in an HDV project in ProRes, it took longer to conform to HDV because it had to convert those ProRes rendered clips.

It's kinda like the taxman...they always get theirs one way or another!

> It's kinda like the taxman...they always get theirs one way or another!

Lol.

I'm kind of curious about the HDV workflow process. I still haven't worked on it yet, but if I do, I'll capture ProRes, because of the HDV issues I've been hearing about. Here, I can't tell my guys "hey, sorry, there was some artifacts, gotta reconform it and check it for artifacts/flashframes and send out that ep probably a day later, if the render goes well."

There are basically 2 camps. Generationally, it is better to capture HDV, render in ProRes if your output is not going to be HDV, and render in HDV if your output is going to be HDV. Going any other method adds compression on top of compression.

However, also knowing that HDV isn't a traditional editing codec (due to it's GOP structure). A cut made in HDV, isn't like a cut made on DV or any other editing codec. Final Cut now has to reorganize the I-frames on conform. If a cut was made on a B-frame, that point has be recalculated into an I-frame from the previous I-frame... This cranks up your rendering time unlike rendering on a normal codec. This, plus issues I've been hearing- flash frames from various parts of the video that isn't in the cut, as well as artifacts. Is this a result of the GOP structure breaking down? Or is it a QT 7.4 issue?

Capturing as ProRes is a way to avoid both the rendering times, as well as the issues I've been hearing. It renders like any other editing codec, BECAUSE it is like most editing codecs, all I-frames. Calculations are easier, what you see is what you get. Not to mention, ProRes is quite the codec- virtually indistinguishable between Uncompressed and ProRes from a Digital Beta (i'm fairly new to working on ProRes, but it seems pretty close).

As far as speed is concerned, it is converted directly on injest, so no time for transcoding is necessary. And because it is captured on injest, and is like any editing codecs, there won't be any unexpected surprises after rendering, nor long conform times.

XDCAM? I'm curious to hear about it too. Render times, machine specs, any issues especially off longer form (20 mins and up).



www.strypesinpost.com

I've been editing native HDV since late 2005, and haven't had any issues with GOP at all...that I know of at least. FCP has made all my edits work somehow (magically) and I haven't had to adapt my edit style or anything to accommodate the GOP structure. It's worked no differently than when I was cutting DV footage.

I'm not familiar with flash frame issues, I'm not really sure what that means.

I think ProRes seems to work great for its intended purpose, but with HDV shooting to HDV mastering, it doesn't make logical sense for me to use it. I obviously have no experience using ProRes for any other format, and wonder if that's what's making the difference in rendering time. I'm not sure how you're avoiding longer rendering times, because in my test my render times were significantly increased. Did I do something wrong? I captured as ProRes and placed it on a ProRes timeline, then did a Print to Video, which was my HDV camcorder.

I'm quite content to stay native HDV for what I'm doing now...I seem to have a good system where I get the majority of my rendering done overnight and am quite efficient in getting projects out the door.

At any rate, good luck!

Casey Petersen
www.unitedvideoinc.com

> I'm not sure how you're avoiding longer rendering times

That's because in most cases, my final output is unlikely going to go back to HDV. There shouldn't be much, if any, increase in render times if you're going back to HDV, since both methods will now require conforming before export.

The flash frames I'm talking about will look almost like a bad render, where it takes shots (a few frames long) from somewhere else in the timeline. I've heard about this a few times already as well as possible sync issues. Most of my concerns are about the reliability of working on codecs with a GOP structure, since FCP has to rearrange the GOPs before export, as well as the rendering time required if I'm not going back out to HDV.

No issues with your projects? How long would the average video be, and also what system/qt/fcp version are you running?



www.strypesinpost.com

I have never seen those kinds of flash frames...and I'm a full time editor and have been using FCP for 2-3 years. My projects are usually between 10 and 60 minutes long, but some are between 2 and 3 hours.

I'm on a Mac Pro quad core system with Tiger and FCP 6.0.3.

I do have issues similar to flash frames, but with audio, if I have a few layers of audio with filters and it needs to be rendered, I sometimes will get audio from a later point in my project overlapping the audio that's supposed to be there. Usually I don't discover this until after my clients get the DVDs though Fortunately it's only happened 3-5 times.

Ever seen that?

I am working on a mac and using FCP 5.1.4
I shot some HDV 1080i60 footage and am attempting to edit it.

it captured fine and it plays fine.

The problem: any time I apply a transition, fade in, fade out, cross dissolve, it speeds up half of the transition and the other half is just a black screen then plays the rest of the clip fine.

This never happens with any other footage - maybe its not a HDV problem , but I dont know what the heck is up.

If anyone can help me on this one - I'd be grateful.

>I sometimes will get audio from a later point in my project overlapping the audio that's
>supposed to be there.

Yes, i see sometimes. What kind of audio are you working with? The sample rates should be 48khz, with sequence set to 48khz.



www.strypesinpost.com

Yep, I'm using 48hhz audio...I make sure of it

That would be 1 cause of audio weirdness. Then, trashing audio render files and forcing a fresh audio mixdown on the sequence.

Select all audio, (ctrl B) disable clips, (ctrl B again) reenable track. This can work, though not a 100 percent of the time (sometimes it still "remembers" render files).

Trashing audio renders can work wonders, especially clips with audio effects. In-built fcp audio effects is something i tend to avoid using, partly because 1) I encountered something similar before, 2) they're clunky to use and 3) because you have Soundtrack Pro as a studio app that sounds much much better.



www.strypesinpost.com

Hey Guys-
Anyone done much MULTICLIP HDV ? I have a project coming up with 2 or 3 cam, 2 hour sequences and will do tests soon, but with possible HDV timecode hiccups, will HDV cause me problems? My eventual out put is standard def DVDs.

Thoughts? Suggestions?


Thanks

Paul

I tried it once and gave up.

What I do for my wedding ceremonies (2-3 HDV cameras unswitched) is layer the tracks on my timeline, scale them to 50% and reposition them on the screen so I can see all cameras at once.

Unless I'm doing something wrong with multiclip, I was only able to see the cameras in the little Canvas window, and not on the big screen. Besides, I was constantly stopping and starting because a camera would move or something, and I kept getting mixed up. Now I just put them on the timeline and razor all tracks, and delete the unused clips on the tracks as often as I can keep up with the edit.

Casey

Hey Casey-

You may want to retry it, as I have found multiclip to be a wonderful timesaving tool ( and I'm fairly new to the multiclip process). In theory you should see a viewer w/ all your cllps visible, and a canvas with whatever cam is selected.

Having said that, the setup is not very intuitive.

This Larry Jordan tutorial helped me.

switched[digitalproducer.digitalmedianet.com]



Luck

paul